Maggie's Farm

We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

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Wednesday, October 3. 2007

Commercial Fishing and Property Rights

We are troubled by overfishing in the Atlantic. It's a "tragedy of the commons."

Don Boudreaux quotes a letter which asks whether an infusion of property rights might solve the problem:

Fisheries are the classic tragedies of the commons and fishermen are behaving rationally when they overfish, for all of the benefits of each fish caught accrue to them while the costs are borne by the population as a whole. Fishermen are also behaving rationally when they “fish” for politicians in Brussels or national capitals, for if French fishermen do not, they will suffer when Italian fishermen do and vice versa.

Read the whole thing.

Posted by Bird Dog in Natural History and Conservation at 08:27 | Comments (2) | Trackbacks (0)

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I agree about the tragedy of the commons, and that "Cod" book is a classic on the subject, but what enforcement mechanisms do you propose? Beefed up Coast Guards (taxpayer dollars) to ensure property rights are respected? Or private armies? Or gun toting fishermen? I agree with your description of the problem, just not sure how one might implement the solution....
#1 Retriever on 2007-10-04 18:12 (Reply)
When people own something of value, they take care of it.
#2 BD on 2007-10-05 00:18 (Reply)

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